From Rasmussen Reports:

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 48% of Likely Voters would vote for their district’s Republican congressional candidate, while 36% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent. The survey data was collected on the seven days ending Sunday, September 5, 2010.

This matches the largest advantage ever measured for the Republicans. Three weeks ago, the GOP also held a 12-point lead.

Still, while the margin has varied somewhat from week-to-week, Republicans have been consistently ahead in the Generic Ballot for over a year. During 2010, the GOP edge has never fallen below five points. When Barack Obama first took office as president of the United States, the Democrats enjoyed a seven-point lead on the Generic Ballot.

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Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Chair of the Senate Ethics Committee, has paid some $30,000 since 2004 for the endorsement of embattled Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) in the context of a scheme that critics charge is unethical and amounts to Waters using her political station to benefit her family members.

According to the Washington Times, Waters “has turned political endorsements into a family business, using federal election laws to charge California candidates and political causes to include their names as her personal picks on a sample ballot, or ‘slate mailer,’ she sends to as many as 200,000 South Central Los Angeles voters.”

The slate mailer business, it turns out, is run by Waters’ daughter, Karen, via her public relations firm.  Records show that Karen Waters’ firm has been paid more than $350,000 since 2004, and has billed a further $82,000 since California’s June primary, for its services in this regard.

It is a scheme that has been criticized by good governance groups including the Sunlight Foundation and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).

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President Obama’s imminent proposal to allow businesses to expense capital equipment purchases through the end of next year is something my colleagues at CEI, particularly Marlo Lewis, have been advocating for some time. Not as “stimulus”, mind you (though it should have some stimulative effect, which is not to condone the refusal to maintain current tax rates — that is, insistence on raising tax rates — as of January 1). But as a greenhouse gas emission reduction scheme.

The logic is simple and the Dutch actually showed (again, accidentally) how this works to reduce emissions: business do not replace capital equipment as early or often as they might like because the tax code disincentivizes it, with depreciation schedules instead of treating it like other business expenses. They therefore postpone purchasing newer, more efficient (and typically more energy efficient) equipment.

Change that, and they will pull through new technology into use.

In a way that is moving investments forward, a la cash for clunkers. But in other ways it is just smart and the right thing to do.

Here’s the downside: yes, you get emission reductions and not by harming economic growth, but actually encouraging it. However, the political class do not get to reward their constituencies with cap-n-trade wealth transfers from you and me to them, don’t increase the cost of energy, and obtain no new control over our lives.

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On the surface you would think there is nothing in common between Las Vegas and Washington DC, other than sharing a Nation where The Jersey Shore is a top rated TV show. One city was built on the profits of lawlessness, the other from the profits of law. But the recently proposed $50 Billion dollar stimulus plan suggests they are more similar than Kardashian sisters.

Las Vegas has always astounded me. While I understand the allure of the big shows, bright lights, and wandering Elvis impersonators; I don’t understand the people who actually believe they’ll return from a Vegas vacation richer than they left.

Unfortunately, some look at Las Vegas as a career rather than a diversion; the ones who believe they have stumbled upon a system that will skew the odds in their favor. In turn they become unwilling contributors to an ever-growing spectacle of neon and debauchery.

The entire town was built on a foundation of these “systems.” All the marble waterfalls, the replicas of other cities, and the glass monoliths and pyramids; were financed by people who think they’re smarter than those who own the casinos.

Most of these systems are based on a nonsensical notion of justice in the cosmos. There is a belief in a mystical power that watches over us all, insuring that not everyone has a bad day. For every flat tire there is someone who was driving behind an armored car that forgot to shut it’s back door.  For every roasted dung beetle, there is an ice cream cone. For every Paris Hilton there is a Stephen Hawking.

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Seeking to bolster the sluggish economy, President Barack Obama is using a Labor Day appearance in Milwaukee to announce he will ask Congress for $50 billion to kick off a new infrastructure plan designed to expand and renew the nation’s roads, railways and runways. …The measures include the “establishment of an Infrastructure Bank to leverage federal dollars and focus on investments of national and regional significance that often fall through the cracks in the current siloed transportation programs,” and “the integration of high-speed rail on an equal footing into the surface transportation program.”

Under mounting pressure to intensify his focus on the economy ahead of the midterm elections, President Obama will call for a $100 billion business tax credit this week… The business proposal – what one aide called a key part of a limited economic package – would increase and permanently extend research and development tax credits for businesses, rewarding companies that develop new technologies domestically and preserve American jobs. It would be paid for by closing other corporate tax loopholes, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the policy has not yet been unveiled.

Today marks the traditional start of the political campaign season. Volunteer your time or donate some dollars to a candidate today. This is important.

The security of our nation is in danger as a direct result of the policies, ideology, and affiliations of our president. Those who clamor for socialism despite its miserable track record invariably defend it by saying it simply wasn’t implemented correctly. Perhaps those relying exclusively on historical accounts warrant a pass in light of a dynamic taking place between Barack Hussein Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton right now.

Back in April, the Los Angeles Times published the results of a poll that showed support for Hillary rising and support for Obama falling among voters. That trend appears to be continuing. Inherent in these numbers is a contingent of people who jumped the Obama ship and have swum over to Hillary’s.

At least those who call for socialism while never having experienced it have a built-in excuse; they never experienced it.

Not so for the Obamatons turned Clintonistas. Both call Chicago home. Hillary was born there and Obama’s political career was launched there – in the home of Bill Ayers to be exact. Rodham became radicalized while at Wellesley College and was influenced heavily by the work of a Marxist / Maoist and leader of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Carl Oglesby. SDS was also the group from which Bill Ayers split to form the Weather Underground.

How about Obama’s ideological hero, Saul Alinsky? While Obama never met Alinsky, he was mentored by his proteges. Unlike Obama, Hillary not only met Alinsky but she interviewed him for her senior thesis at Wellesley. At one point, he offered her a job with his Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF) – a job she ultimately declined, though ostensibly not for lack of reverence for uncle Saul or his work.

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When America gave up its position as the producer-in-chief and became the consumer-in-chief, “essential skilled workers” became dirty words in our lexicon.

The cultural shift is fast producing an “industrial tsunami” that threatens our economy and way of life. Ironically enough, we’re facing a crisis shortage of skilled workers at a time of dramatically high unemployment.

We must re-connect this disconnect or face the consequences. America works when Americans are working.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 25 percent of the working population will reach retirement age by 2012, resulting in a potential shortage of nearly 10 million skilled workers. This heightens the price our nation is paying for dismantling so many in-school vocational training programs during the past few decades.

The current shortage already sharply reduces the growth of U.S. gross domestic product, contributing to our overall economic problem. America’s infrastructure is falling apart before our eyes. Municipal water and sewer systems are failing, and more bridges are unsafe to cross. Yet the nationwide shortfall of more than 500,000 welders is causing already-funded repair projects to be canceled or delayed. (more…)

With the setting of the sun this Wednesday night, Jews across the world will begin the observance of the Yomim Noraim (Days of Awe), a ten day period book-ended by the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This year’s High Holiday period comes at an interesting time for America as the first night of Rosh Hashanah comes a mere fifty-four days before the United States goes to the polls to between two radically different directions, one which emphasizes personal responsibility, the other emphasizes a reliance on government. Only one of those directions is compatible with the true meaning of the High Holidays.

When Congress created Labor Day in the late 1800s, it was to placate an increasingly hostile labor movement.  At a time when American workers needed protection from heavy-handed industrial bosses, labor unions made sense.

But with the growing effort by Big Labor to unionize public employees, it’s left its mission of worker protection from dangerous conditions and now has increasingly become a leech on the taxpayers.  Public employees hardly need protection from their employer, the government.

If there’s any segment of society that needs protection from the government it’s taxpayers, not their employees.

Big Labor’s legacy today is that of creating pension systems that are continuing to plunge deeper into the red.  Some reports indicate the collective debt, just of school employee pensions, is around $1 trillion.

Public employee unions have also created scenarios where the health benefits of their members now cost school districts nearly $24,000 in places like Milwaukee.

And they’ve instituted schemes where teachers receive raises for not dying over the summer.  With negotiated “step raises,” increases are based on years of service, not value added to the “company.”

Big Labor is bankrupting government – and we should continue honoring that?

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If my experience with one U.S. Department of Justice agency is indicative of how the federal government operates in this new era of transparency, then I must conclude that transparency causes “blindness.”

Several times during the past 18 months, I’ve contacted people at the National Institute of Justice — the research, development and evaluation arm of the DoJ in Washington, D.C. — with seemingly-innocuous questions about a grant the agency awarded to a state mental health agency in Oklahoma almost five years ago. NIJ’s answers would better equip me to explain to my readers how NIJ works. Unfortunately, it seems NIJ officials prefer I remain “blind” to what’s going on inside the agency.

Some background: Curious to learn details about NIJ’s criteria for granting non-competitive awards, I forwarded several questions to Jolene Hernon July 28. After pointing out to my contact in the NIJ Office of Communications that less than one percent of the total amount of NIJ’s annual awards in 2009 was non-competitive, according to the Guidelines Regarding Non-Competitive Awards published on the NIJ web site, I asked several questions as follows:

• I asked Hernon to explain whether or not the guidelines used in granting non-competitive awards have changed since Jan. 1, 2005, and, if they have changed, asked her to explain those changes;

• Prefacing my request with “If the guidelines have not changed,” I asked her to explain the basis upon which a particular non-competitive award was granted; and

• Finally, I asked for a copy of the NIJ director’s “determination in writing,” as called for in the current guidelines, that the award in question was worthy of non-competitive status.

I asked the final question above after reading on the NIJ web site that the agency’s policy is to make non-competitive awards only under the following circumstances:

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Today is Labor Day. We will commemorate it by working. This is the traditional start of the election season and there is much to do between now and November.

Saturday, August 28, 2010, my husband, two daughters, and I attended the Restoring Honor rally in Washington D.C. It was a wonderful experience for us all. The crowd was huge (500,000 + people), very peaceful, and individuals were kind and patient. You might think that the important part of the weekend was the three and a half hours (or more) that we spent together during the rally. When I was sitting under the bright, hot sun with my friends from Texas, I thought so too. But I was wrong…

During the first leg of our trip from D.C. to Chicago, our two daughters, ages 22 and 16, sat next to an African-American gentleman wearing an Obama inauguration t-shirt. After take-off, he mentioned to them that he had travelled to D.C. to attend Al Sharpton’s Reclaim the Dream rally. Our older daughter told him that they were in D.C. for the Glenn Beck Restoring Honor rally, and the conversation took off from there.

The gentlemen told my daughters that he went to the Restoring Honor rally with several friends because Al Sharpton told them that we were holding a negative protest that was against MLK’s message and against those who had gathered for Rev. Sharpton’s rally. He said that when he and his friends arrived that they didn’t see anything that they expected, so they stayed a bit to listen. They realized that Restoring Honor was not anything like what Rev. Sharpton told them to expect. They then returned to the Sharpton rally to try to tell several people that what Rev. Sharpton was saying about our rally was not true. He saw that our rally was not a political or hateful rally, and that it was not meant to divide Americans. He tried to get a message to Rev. Sharpton prior to his speech, but either he didn’t get the message or he ignored the message. Rev. Sharpton went forward with his original speech as planned.

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We are in the midst of a national debate over the size and scope of government and I am hopeful.  Conservative Republican Joe Miller’s remarkable victory in the Alaska Republican Senate Primary should have Americans feeling optimistic about the prospects of real change coming to Washington in 2011. Miller’s victory over incumbent Senator Lisa Murkowski is just the latest jolt to an establishment that has paved the way for an unsustainable $13.3 trillion national debt and record budget deficits.

My PAC, Citizens United Political Victory Fund (www.cupvf.org) has a goal for the 2009-2010 election cycle to recapture the majorities in the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives by helping to elect candidates who will fight for conservative principles and challenge the agenda of the Obama Administration.  To date, CUPVF has made more than $300,000 in direct contributions to 53 federal candidates who are campaigning to put an end to this fiscal insanity.

If Miller is elected to the Senate in November, along with fellow fiscal conservatives Pat Toomey (PA), Marco Rubio (FL), Sharron Angle (NV), Ken Buck (CO), and Rand Paul (KY), business as usual in Washington will be over.  And good riddance!  After all, one U.S. Senator has the power to bring the legislative and appropriations process to a halt.  Imagine what this group of potential newcomers, with a clear mandate to stop the spending, could do to get America’s fiscal house in order!   Establishment incumbents from both parties should beware that the taxpayer funded party is about to end.   Voters are giving the order:  enough is enough.

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You are probably familiar by now with this infamous graph published by the White House in January 2009 highlighting their expectations for the impact of the Recovery Act on the rate of unemployment. Far from leveling off at 8% and then declining, the actual unemployment rate ran up to 10% by the end of 2009 and has declined only slightly since to 9.5%, largely due to a decline in labor force participation. This in spite of the rapid passage of the massive $787 billion stimulus bill in February 2009. (Geoff at the Innocent Bystanders blog deserves everlasting credit for being the first to point out this disconnect.)

With the White House and other Democrats resolutely sticking to their claim that the stimulus bill “saved or created” 3-4 million jobs, I thought it might be worthwhile to point out that the very same January 2009 White House report also included an industry by industry forecast of where these 3-4 million jobs would come from. Here it is:

Thanks to the inclination of economists to model verifiable data (even when they are pulling numbers out of the sky), these industry categories happen to align perfectly with employment data tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Thus we can easily compare the actual changes in employment to the figures forecast by the White House. In the table below, I’ve calculated the net change in employment by industry from February 2009, when the stimulus bill was passed, to July 2010, using the latest data available from the BLS. (Click row headings for data source.)

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Today, in 1774, the first Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia.

From Business Insider:

As everyone should know by now, my main concern with unions is specifically with public unions. While I do not care for unions at all, and never have, at least with private unions, someone other than corrupt politicians buying votes is bargaining at the other end of the table.

In the case of public unions, if politicians strike a bad deal, taxpayers foot the bill. In the case of private corporations, if management strikes a bad deal, the company goes bankrupt, shareholders take a hit, or the jobs move elsewhere, as soon as the contract is up.

Except in few cases every now and again, private unions just cannot seem to understand this simple economic fact.

Machinists Union Pickets Cessna Aircraft

The Kansas Wichita Eagle highlights the typical union response, public or private, in Cessna’s initial offer to Machinists includes wage cut:

Machinist union members at Cessna Aircraft picketed near the company’s plant in southwest Wichita on Thursday to protest jobs being sent outside the city.

Members fought strong, gusty afternoon winds and carried signs that read “Keep it Made in Wichita,” “Outsourcing is Treason” and “We built the Air Capital,” as they picketed at K-42 and Hoover roads. Some carried American flags.

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